If creepy crawly things bother you, skip this post!

I wanted to share this experience with you before I ended my posts on Costa Rica.
The first day at Wilson's Botanical Gardens I was heading for my room and saw this black kind of blob thing at the front door. It was moving, I knew it was alive, but had no idea what it was. I had never seen anything like this before. Since it was moving so slowly I figured it was safe to take a closer look. And besides, it looked like it was heading to go under my front door!

Once I got a close look, I ran up to the office to tell management, I figured they would want to capture and study this thing, or things, or do something kind with it, like remove it from my front door. I described it, in a hurried, out of breath, emergency type voice, and was calmly told, it was ok, nothing bad, it was a cluster of Beetles in caterpillar form! I had no idea that beetles started out as caterpillars! I assume they move together as one to protect their individual selves from looking small and enticing to all the birds here.

I have a video of them moving that I really wanted to show you, its truly amazing, but I can't figure out how to turn the sound off on the video. If you know how, let me know please. In the end, I gently scooted them over with a leaf (a very large one) onto the grass away from my door, as the guide suggested. I think nature is amazing!

Beetle ART

I bought this from a Panamanian artist and I think it is so very cool. I love the wood the artist choose to paint, notice the sides and how it has eroded. (proper word for rot away I think). The color brightens up my livingroom and I think insects, some insects anyway, are very interesting. And we do have BIG beetles here, not this big, but very close!!

I saw one the other night on my front porch waiting for me when I got home after dinner and I kid you not, when I saw it under the patio chair, I thought it was a crab!!! I got a bit closer (very carefully do I need even say) and saw that it was the largest beetle I have ever seen alive in person. It was about 2.5 inches wide and square, not long! Seriously, it looked like a land crab sitting there. And not nearly as pretty as my little art painting.